‘This is achieved by spending months or years working with local subjects, building an encyclopaedic knowledge of behaviour, light and perspective.

‘I’m delighted that my endeavours have been so generously rewarded.’

The competition’s head judge Chris Packham said: ‘We upload more than 700 billion photographs each year and, as much as they communicate in many ways, in terms of photographic merit the vast majority are total rubbish.

‘What we are looking for are those images which have an instant and enduring “wow” factor.’

Commenting on the challenge presented by photographing birds, Packham said: ‘They fly off, don’t listen to a word you say and are a much favoured subject in the wildlife photography genre – hence there is massive competition, making it hard to say something new with an image.

‘But the winning image exemplifies this art perfectly – a much photographed, familiar and accessible subject is represented in an entirely new and fabulously imaginative way. Roll on next year.’

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